Best Bakery case

On 1 March 2002, communal frenzy enveloped Vadodara. The Best Bakery, a small outlet in the Hanuman Tekri area of Vadodara, was attacked by a mob, which burned down the bakery, killing 14 people. This attack was part of the 2002 Gujarat riots. As per a televised interview by Zaheera Shaikh, one of the survivors who had witnessed the entire saga, a large mob surrounded the bakery in the evening, around 8 pm. They first stole all the goods that were kept in the bakery including sacks of flour. Thereafter they set fire to the bakery and the people inside, most of them Zaheera's relatives, shouting that no one should escape alive from it. Amnesty International reports that in many cases of the Gujarat violence, police recorded complaints in a "defective" manner, failed to collect witnesses' statements as well as corroborative evidence and did not investigate the responsibility of eminent suspects. The Best Bakery case was seen by human rights organizations in India as a test case given that what Amnesty calls "strong evidence" against the accused existed, but the victims gained little justice. ==Case in 2003 and acquittal==

The case was tried at a fast court by the Vadodara sessions court judge Hemantsinh U Mahida. It lasted less than two months (9 May to 27 June 2003). Further, in court on 23 March 2003, as many as 37 of the 73 witnesses, including Sheikh, turned hostile. It was later alleged by their former mentors that they had received threats to their lives, including from Madhu Shrivastav. Other witnesses gave garbled and self-contradictory witness account, strikingly at variance with the lucid, grammatical and logical written affidavits which had previously been filed in their name. The prosecution claimed that these witnesses had suffered head injuries and were not in a mental state to give an accurate account of their experiences, but could not explain the lucidity of the affidavits. The state government pointed to the lapses by the Gujarat Police in "registering and recording of FIR" and on the part of the prosecution in "recording of evidence" of witnesses in the Best Bakery case. As a result of all these, the prosecution's case collapsed in court and all of the 21 accused were acquitted. The judgment was delivered on 27 June 2003 by additional sessions judge Hemantsinh U Mahida of the Vadodara fast track court. The judgment said, "It was proved beyond doubt that a violent mob had attacked the bakery and killed 12 persons. However, there was no legally acceptable evidence to prove that any of the accused presented before the court had committed the crime." The judgment was critical of the police for delay in registering FIR and for not investigating the incident properly and harassing innocent people, including the accused. ==Reactions==

A large section of the press expressed outrage for a prolonged period at the acquittals. It was reported that key witnesses in the case had lied in court out of fear for their lives as they had been given death threats. Key witnesses in the case include the wife and daughter of the bakery owner. They accused party politicians of threatening and harassing them into withdrawing their testimony. According to their testimony to the police and the National Human Rights Commission, 500 people had attacked the bakery. Amnesty International criticized the judgment as "the lack of government commitment to ensuring justice to victims of the communal violence in Gujarat." The Gujarat government responded by pointing out many other cases where the guilty were left unpunished. Solicitor General Mukul Rohatgi cited the anti-Sikh riots of 1984 and said many of the accused are still free. ==Re-trial and hostile witnesses==

Soon after the sessions court judgement, Zaheera and her mother gave interviews to the media stating that they had lied in court. On 5 July 2003, Zaheera and her mother told The Sunday Express that Zaheera had lied in court because she had received death threats. On 7 July 2003, Zaheera told the media that Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) MLA Madhu Srivastava and his cousin, Congress councilor Chandrakant Srivastava were behind the threats, hence she sought a re-trial outside Gujarat. Due to this, media coverage and protests by several citizens groups, the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) visited Vadodara on 8 July to examine documents related to the case. The NHRC moved a Special Leave Petition in the Supreme Court on 31 July 2003 asking for a retrial outside Gujarat. Aware of media outrage, three Supreme Court judges ordered the head of Gujarat police and the chief secretary of Gujarat to appear before the court in order to explain their actions in the incident. On 24 September 2004, charges were framed by Judge Abhay Thipsay in Mumbai and the retrial began on 4 October 2004. During the first few weeks, the formal prosecution witnesses were examined and witnesses to the Best Bakery massacre began to testifying on 27 October 2004 as part of the proceedings of Case 315 of 2004 at the Greater sessions court at Mazgaon, Mumbai. These witnesses included Tufel Ahmed, Raees Khan Pathan and Shehzad Khan, who worked at the bakery and witnessed the events. ==Perjury==

A serious dent to Best Bakery case key witness Zaheera Sheikh's credibility, a Supreme Court-appointed committee has indicted her as a "self-condemned liar" falling to "inducements" by "certain persons" to give "inconsistent" statements during the trial of the case. A bench comprising Justice Arijit Pasayat and Justice H K Sema opened the sealed report and read out the three main conclusions of the committee headed by Supreme Court Registrar General B M Gupta. At the same time, the committee gave a clean chit to social activist Teesta Setalavad of the charges of inducement levelled against her by Zahira. On 10 January 2005, the court referred the matter for inquiry on being faced with the flip-flops of Zahira much to the embarrassment of her one time protector and social activist Setalavad. The bench, after glancing through the over 150-page report, said that the committee has come to the conclusion that there was inducement given to Zahira by certain persons and that there were inconsistencies in her statements. The court made it clear that it has not accepted the report and sought the opinion of the counsel for both Zahira and Setalavad in regard to 'acceptability' of the report. ==Life sentences==

In February 2006, a court in India convicted nine of the 21 people of murder, sentencing them to life imprisonment. It acquitted 8 others, while issuing warrants for the arrest of four missing persons. Of the nine convicted for life by the trial court, Bombay High Court acquitted five for want of evidence, but upheld the sentence in respect of the remaining four. The judgment, called "landmark" by BBC journalist Sanjoy Majumder, brought the case to an end. The case has the legacy of being "one of the country's most controversial and high profile trials." ==2012 Bombay High Court==

On 9 July 2012, the Bombay High Court, upheld the life sentences of four accused, Sanjay Thakkar, Bahadursingh Chauhan, Sanabhai Baria and Dinesh Rajbhar on the basis of four eyewitness accounts, who were injured bakery employees and identified the accused. It acquitted five accused, Rajubhai Baria, Pankaj Gosavi, Jagdish Rajput, Suresh alias Lalo Devjibhai Vasava and Shailesh Tadvi, for lack of evidence. ==See also==